Dont mean to semi highjack, but is a Colmado a good money making business here and if so are we talking good or modest living. I know it depends on the biz as always just curious in general
I had the equivalent of a colmado in a village of about 500 in the Pacific Islands. I made a modest, but very reliable income on it, which would have been an above average income by local standards. It was only 8'x12' and even then, I was grossing US$2000+ a week with a 15%-20% mark-up. You'd have to do some footwork to get a good location and you might need to be your own distributor by making town runs.
In the DR, you would do well by buying dry goods in bulk and then using a reliable scale to sell many things in smaller units. The thing that would drive me nuts in the DR would be people wanting to 5 pesos worth of Corn Flakes or Tomato Paste.
Alternatively, you might be able to work the plastic "Jobber" strip market. This is where you work as an independent distributor who sells goods on "jobber" strips and other impulse buys. You see jobber strips all the time that have a dozen of some handy item or cheap toy on them. At one place I worked for, we did well selling lighters, car air fresheners, cheap toys, candy on strips(like lolipops), toy cars, hair ties, Alka-Seltzer, etc, etc, etc. We'd get toy "matchbox" cars in boxes of 20 for $6, wholesale them for $10 a box, and then they'd retail for $20 when sold one at a time. Basically, you buy in bulk from some 20 y 40 and then sell by the dozen to small shops.
This is what I mean by a jobber strip. Stores often use independent marketers to sell them to them full of items, a few strips at a time:
You can make your own jobber strips by tying a bunch of clothes pins to lengths of string.